Lovely horsey day and a question....

[ally112038]

Today I had a dressage lesson from an extremely talented dressage rider named Liz Mason. She rides to Pre St George level and we are lucky enough that she lives close by and knows the owner of our yard

Comments

[meus_ovatio]

I suppose that if you view whip-shyness as a serious obstacle, your immediate concern would be to work through it, and then on to getting better/higher at/in dressage. You should be able to work through it, given a personal relationship and a level of trust with the horse. If you don't want to, you don't want to, but I don't think that your horse stands to be horribly traumatized by being introduced to non-abusive tool use. Then there is the issue of letting our horses be afraid and not helping them. Do we want them to be afraid, as much as we don't want to scare them? It is a tough place to be. Is it better to just let the horse be afraid, or will this fear continue to cause problems his/her entire life?

[ally112038]

You have just put in to words exactly why I am so torn! I hate the thought of him being afraid of something so much and knowing that I will be good and kind and patient with him makes me want to help him overcome his fear. But then there is a part of me that is worried that because of his history I might undo all the good we've achieved with him.
He used to have an absolute terror of plastic bags (he had one tied to his headcollar as a 'joke' once to make him gallop. he did gallop - straight in to a fence and still bears the scars to prove it) and since plastic bags are a common thing to encounter around where I ride, I had to get him past the fear. I managed to do that pretty much and whilst he will give them a good hard stare now he will walk past them without any trauma. But I did that for him - so we could hack and explore and not be worried about bolting everytime it was windy and one might blow across his path. But the whip thing? Is that for him or for me?

[meus_ovatio]

I think that you can decide either way and either way it is a right decision.

[12to15steps]

What about light spurs instead?

[ally112038]

I already school with ball end spurs. Sorry - should have made that clearer. Even with spurs George can drop behind the leg when he is feeling in a particularly cob-like mood and although I can get him back, it takes a lot of effort even with the spurs.

[glenatron]

What about using a cordero type thing- I often ride with a piece of light rope that I'll swing from side to side in front of me to back up my leg. In fact these days I'm usually riding off a mecate so I just use the tail of that, but swinging a rope is a good alternative to using a whip in that it's effective to the horse but typically it's not really making contact- with me it's more likely to hit my thigh than pony.

I think I would want my horse to be alright with whips being around even if I wasn't using one because people often do and I wouldn't want him getting anxious at a show if other people were wandering around with them. Also, you may find he's more or less alright with them now. Horses tend to live much more in the present than we do so we expect them to be traumatised by their past but that isn't always the way it falls out. Maybe it's worth just seeing how he reacts to one.

[ally112038]

That's a really interesting idea - I've never heard of a cordero though.......how long? how thick and where would I get one?
I see what you are saying about horses living in the present and I think you are right. But the whip fear doesn't seem to be going away - I tried a whip a couple of months ago and it was a no-go.

[appolonia]

When you tried the whip, did you approach it as an item of fear which needed to be overcome, or did you just pick up a whip and (while still being AWARE of his possible fear) expect him to be ok with it- to start, just being rubbed on him, and so on?

Horses definitely sense your intention. So, if you're expecting him to be afraid of it, he probably will be. If you act like you expect it to be no big deal (but again, be AWARE of his possible fear, and don't TRY to scare him!), its more likely that will respond positively.

[glenatron]

What I use is the string from an old parelli-style stick-and-string, which is something like this one - more or less 6mm marine braid, which I use doubled up so it works out as about 3 feet long and has a bit of movement in it.

[hagazusa]

My Welsh pony is also looong backed and was ridden high and hollow before I bought her so it's a continuing struggle to get her to engage her hindquarters effectively.

She's not whip shy though so I can carry a schooling whip.

I don't know if this will work for George but a school horse I used to ride was extremely whip shy because of previous abuse. :( But sometimes he would completely ignore you if you had nothing to back up your aids. So when he was having one of his "let's ignore the aids" day, the instructor would have me "carry" a short crop. I wasn't supposed to use it, just hold it, and that woke him up. If he would suddenly get scared of it, even though I wasn't using it on him, I could always drop it.

When lunging, you can lunge with two lunge lines, so one line wraps around his rear quarters and you can swing that against his bum to get him moving from behind. It's not a whip, just a soft lunge line tickling his bum.

[12to15steps]

That was going to be my next suggestion - carry a little weeny crop. :) My Trakehner is a major wuss about whips (no abuse that I'm aware of, just a big chicken), but as he's gotten a little lazy as he's aged, his leasee now carries a little tiny crop. He's motivated by its mere presence - she never has to use it.

[dragonflypony]

you could try to work "whip therapy" into your program...sorry its late, goofy titles are coming out.

What i'm trying to say is, start rubbing him all over with a whip on the ground, use any length he will tolerate at first and increase the size and use any goodies/treats/rewards you want for the first little while if that would help chill him out. Make the whip a good thing on the ground and transition it to the saddle until he is relaxed when you're carrying it and then at that point start to use it as an aid.

Whenever i'm riding a younger horse or a project, even if they aren't shy about them, i will still rub the whip all over at the end or beginning of the ride from the saddle...just one of my quirks i guess...

[glory_horse]

This is exactly what I'm going to suggest.

It's a good theraphy for horses with whip shy problem. Firstly, you will need to present the whip/crop to him slowly. Then do as dragonflypony suggested; rubbing the tool all over his body and eventually start using it when you're riding.
You need to be patient with him though. If he's really really scared of it, the theraphy might take some times to achieve.

I think long whip can be helpful when you train a horse, especially in dressage principle. It will come to handy when you train/practice some movements such as Turn on the forehand, Haunches-in,even to teach him to do a square hault. So,yeah, it will be great if your horse can overcome his whip shy problem. :)

[kizzalene]

I think whip therapy is a good idea. I'd even suggest rubbing some fresh mint leaves over it before you take it near him - not to suggest that he licks/chews/eats the whip (those not being great for equine digestion) but the positive connotations he has with the minty smell may start to ameliorate the negative connotations of the whip.

Just an idea!